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Media coverage of Stebic case rises
Media coverage of Lisa Stebic increased this week as television, print and Internet media heightened national awareness about the mother of two from Plainfield who has been missing for 25 days, since April 30. Melanie and Mark Greenberg of Naperville, relatives who have been speaking on behalf of Lisa's family, appeared Wednesday night on CNN's "Larry King Live."

May 25, 2007
By TED SLOWIK Staff Writer
Media coverage of Lisa Stebic increased this week as television, print and Internet media heightened national awareness about the mother of two from Plainfield who has been missing for 25 days, since April 30.

Melanie and Mark Greenberg of Naperville, relatives who have been speaking on behalf of Lisa's family, appeared Wednesday night on CNN's "Larry King Live." Joe Stebic, the father of Lisa's husband, Craig, phoned in during the show. Internet search powerhouse Yahoo! posted a link to the findlisastebic.com Web site from its home page Wednesday evening, and the site received about 10,000 hits an hour at first, said Leigh Harris, a CBS reporter from Phoenix who has been helping the Greenbergs coordinate Internet, video and other media exposure.

» Click to enlarge image

Lisa Stebic's sisters hold hands after a press conference earlier this month in Chicago, as members of the media take photos of family snapshots of Lisa. She was last seen April 30.
(AP file)

» Click to enlarge image

Despite being in the middle of a bitter divorce, Lisa and Craig Stebic share this home at 13244 Red Star Drive in Plainfield.
(Terence Guider-Shaw/Staff photographer)

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"It was actually too much of a good thing," Harris said.

Tamara Halstead, a Web site coordinator based in the Washington, D.C., area, who is helping the Greenbergs and Harris, said a video tribute to Lisa had to be removed from the site's home page. The Web host suspended the account due to concerns that the high volume of traffic could cause multiple sites to crash.

"When it hit Yahoo!, around 6:30 or 7 o'clock, it was getting about 10,000 hits an hour," Halstead said.

Regular site visitors started sending e-mails when the site went down, wondering whether authorities had intervened.

"We had a lot of panicking people thinking we'd been hacked," Harris said.

Ironically, the site was overwhelmed despite having moved earlier that day to a larger host capable of handling a huge increase in traffic anticipated because of the Greenberg's Larry King appearance.

Also Wednesday, The Associated Press filed a story offering an overview of Stebic's disappearance. The story, headlined, "Mystery surrounds missing Illinois woman," appears on Web sites of dozens of newspapers from Vermont to Utah, and as far away as Australia.

In addition to CNN, the Fox News and MSNBC networks have been reporting regular updates on the case

Lisa Stebic vanished from her home in Plainfield, Illinois on April 30. Her estranged husband, Craig, was the last person known to have seen her alive. Although the Stebices were divorcing, they were still living in the same house. However, the day she disappeared, Lisa mailed off a petition seeking to have Craig removed from the home. In her divorce case, she accused him of being cruel, inconsiderate, domineering and verbally abusive. Yesterday Craig's legal bid to gain custody, temporary sole custody of the two children, was rejected.

Joining us in Chicago is Mark Greenburg, the cousin of Lisa Stebic, the Illinois mother and wife who has missing since April 30, and Melanie, his wife. The Greenburgs have been speaking out on behalf of the family during this ordeal.

On the phone is Joe Stebic, she's the father of Lisa Stebic's estranged husband, Craig.

And in New York is Lisa Bloom of Court TV.

Lisa, you want to get us up to date on this?

LISA BLOOM, COURT TV: Well, absolutely. As you say, Larry, what many legal observers thought was a strange move by Craig Stebic was denied by the judge. The judge said there's no reason to grant temporary custody to Craig just because Lisa has disappeared. The grounds that Craig had sought to get sole custody were simply that she was gone. She could come back at any time and take the children. The judge rejected that.

It's now been over three weeks, as you say, Larry, that she's been missing. The only forensic evidence that's been found so far is some of Lisa's blood found on a tarp in Craig's car. Other than that, there's no evidence of her whereabouts, no credit card receipts, for example, no cell phone calls. She simply seems to have vanished.

KING: Mark Greenburg, do you believe in foul play here?

MARK GREENBURG, COUSIN OF LISA STEBIC: Well, you know, Larry, at this point after 23 days, it's getting hard to keep up hope. But I think, you know, we have to keep up hope. We've seen so much support from the community, from, from family. We just keep hoping and praying.

KING: Melanie, how old are the children?

MELANIE GREENBURG, MARK GREENBURG'S WIFE: How old are the children? KING: Yes.

MELANIE GREENBURG: They're 10 and 12. She has a daughter that's 12 and a son that's 10. This is very difficult.

KING: How are they dealing with this?

MELANIE GREENBURG: It's very difficult. Lisa worked as a lunch room lady at a cafeteria in a school so that she could be home for her children every day after school. These are children that are used to seeing their mom every day after school. And it's extremely difficult. It's been over three weeks. It's hard for the entire family. Everyone is in anguish. We know that Lisa would never leave her children. She would never do this to her family. And so we're just -- it's a complete mystery. We don't know what could have happened to Lisa.

KING: Joe Stebic is on the phone. He's the father of Lisa's husband, Craig. What do you make of this, Joe?

JOE STEBIC, LISA STEBIC'S FATHER-IN-LAW: Well, I'll tell you what, it's all a mystery to me. And just like I heard this lady now talk about that blood again, how come, one station comes up with finding Lisa's blood in a tarp in a truck, and all the rest of the stations deny it?

KING: What do you make of this, then, Joe? What's your read on it? What does your son tell you?

STEBIC: He just doesn't know what happened to her. I know we were up here in Michigan on a Sunday -- I mean over the long weekend. And they all went home Sunday and I went home Sunday. And I talked to him Sunday night and that was it. Then I didn't know nothing until he called one morning and said Lisa never showed up. That's the only thing I know.

KING: Joe, how well do you get along with Lisa?

STEBIC: I love Lisa. She was a nice lady.

KING: Do you at all believe anywhere in your system, in your gut, that your son could commit violence?

STEBIC: No, I don't believe that not at all.

KING: Lisa, what's the story about one station saying blood and another station saying no?

BLOOM: Well, the reports that we have heard are that the police have indicated that blood -- a small amount of her blood was found on a tarp in his truck. That certainly doesn't necessarily make him guilty of murder. After all, they were a married couple. It would be typical to find any kind of blood, saliva, et cetera, of hers in his drink.

But one question I would have for Joe is, did Craig report her missing or was it, as had been reported, a neighbor that reported her missing the next morning? If Craig says she disappeared at 6:00 p.m., why didn't he call 911 immediately?

STEBIC: Well, because for the simple reason, Craig told me that she's been leaving every night almost at 6:00 or 6:15 to go do exercises or do something.

BLOOM: And then she's gone all night? And she's gone all night, leaves her children alone all night?

STEBIC: Well, who's at home? Who's home? Craig is working every day and he and the kids go to bed at 9:00 at night because he's got to get up about 4:00 or 4:30 to go to work.

KING: Mark, do you suspect Craig?

MARK GREENBURG: You know...

STEBIC: Yes.

MARK GREENBURG: ... Larry, at this point, you know, we're really relying on the Plainfield Police Department. There are a lot of media reports. Our hopes and prayers are that Lisa is still out there somewhere to be found. But we're relying on the Plainfield Police, the FBI, to look into all possible situations and circumstances and hopefully find something that will bring Lisa back to us.

KING: No question, Joe, that your son did not do anything wrong?

STEBIC: I can't believe that.

And another thing I'd like to say is, if she was so abused, isn't there any kind of a police report or anything? That's what I don't understand. I hear she's been a battered wife. I heard she was taking classes someplace as a battered wife or whatever it was. See, I don't have no TV up here where I'm at. I only go to town and people tell me what they hear on TV.

KING: So you're saying if that was the charge in the divorce, why weren't there police reports?

BLOOM: Larry, can I respond to that?

KING: Yes, sure.

BLOOM: She indicated in the papers that she filed, that she mailed off on the day she went missing, verbal abuse, verbal abuse. I've not heard anything about physical abuse but that he was domineering, verbally abusive and controlling. And that's why she wanted the court to require him leave the house and leave her alone with the children.

STEBIC: You know what; Craig was never verbally abusive to her. Every time I was down there, they seemed to get along just fine.

KING: Let me get a break. We'll be back with more with Mark and Melanie Greenburg, and Joe Stebic and Lisa Bloom of Court TV. Don't go away.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MELANIE GREENBURG: We just pray for her safe return.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: On Saturday, family and friends marked Lisa's 38th birthday with a somber celebration that included a vigil and a birthday cake bearing Lisa's picture.

CROWD: Happy birthday dear Lisa.

MARK GREENBURG: We continue to hope and pray that with all of the things that we've been doing, that people are out there looking and keeping their eyes open. And if they see something or realize they've seen something, they'll talk to the Plainfield police.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Coming up next week on LARRY KING LIVE, former first lady Nancy Reagan on the just-published Reagan diaries and what they reveal about the man who adored her, President Ronald Reagan. That's a week from Thursday, May 31, on LARRY KING LIVE.

Joe Stebic, does your son give you any hint as to what he thinks his wife might be?

STEBIC: No, all he told me one time was she was on that computer and he figures something that happened over that computer in email stuff. That's all I know.

KING: Is he leading any kind of search? Does he keep in touch with the police?

STEBIC: Well, no, because the police get in touch with him every once in a while. But every day I call, I ask him, I said, "Did anybody call? Did the cops call?" And he says no.

KING: Do the police tell you anything, Mark?

MARK GREENBURG: Well, you know, Larry, we do talk to the police fairly frequently. They're trying to keep the family as updated as possible. Obviously, one of the concerns that they have and that we have is that their investigation not be hampered, impaired, by whatever they may tell. They've got to make sure the Constitution is satisfied. So they're very cautious about what they do tell us. But we're in regular contact and they're telling us as much as they possibly can. KING: Melanie, frankly, it doesn't look good, does it?

MELANIE GREENBURG: It is very hard to be optimistic this many days out. We appreciate the opportunity you're giving us because we're trying to get Lisa's picture out there as wide -- to as wide an audience as we can. We don't know if someone may have been passing through the Chicago area and has seen something. We just urge anyone to call the Plainfield Police with any tip or any lead that they might have. All we know is there's no way Lisa would leave her children or her family like this. So we don't know what has happened.

KING: Lisa, is there a running theory in this case?

BLOOM: Well, I want to say, first, that the police have said that Craig Stebic is not a suspect. Having said that, we know that women in abusive relationships, and that's what she claims in the court papers, the most dangerous time for them is the time that they decide to leave the relationship. And Craig's dad is right. She had been exercising a lot. She lost about 40 pounds in the months before her disappearance. She got a tattoo of a butterfly on her back, symbolizing rebirth. And according to all of her friends, she was looking forward to this divorce. She was starting a new life and she was optimistic. So it's very odd, and certainly does sound like foul play that she would simply disappear and never be heard from again.

May 16th, 07 Artical out of place.http://cbs2chicago.com/local/local_story_136123324.html
Stebic's Husband Accuses Authorities Of Coercion
Police, FBI Raided Missing Woman's House On Tuesday
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(STNG) PLAINFIELD, Ill. While police say they have no suspects in the disappearance of a local mother of two, her husband's attorney believes a midnight search of her house was an attempt to intimidate her husband and coerce a confession.

For the first time Tuesday, investigators said they are expanding their search for Lisa Stebic to include the possibility of foul play -- and served early-morning search warrants at the Stebic house as the next step in the investigation.

Lisa Stebic, 37, was reported missing May 1. Police say there has been no activity on her cell phone or credit cards since April 30, when she was last seen at home about 6 p.m.

"We need to focus part of our investigation on the fact that she may not have voluntarily disappeared," said Police Chief Don Bennett.

Although investigators are considering that possibility, Bennett said they have no hard evidence of foul play.

Plainfield police, an FBI evidence response team and a special operations unit from the Joliet Police Department searched the house at 13244 Red Star Drive, and the Stebics' vehicles early Tuesday morning.

Craig Stebic's attorney Dion Davi said Stebic was not allowed to call him during the search, which police said lasted about four and a half hours. Bennett said Stebic was offered the chance to call his attorney and declined.

Police investigate body of woman found in Joliet
May 28, 2007 (JOLIET, IL) - Police in southwest suburban Chicago are investigating the death of a woman whose body was found along a horse trail in a park Monday.

Authorities say the death is being investigated as a homicide.
Joliet Police Officer Amy Chochola says the body was found at U.S. Route Six and Farrell Road in Joliet.

She declined to give further information.

The Will County Coroner's office says the woman's body was found near a horse trail at a park.

By Angela Rozas
Tribune staff reporter
Published May 28, 2007, 7:21 PM CDT
Joliet police are investigating the murder of a female whose body was found near a wooded area Monday, authorities said.

The body of the female was found in an open area on the Pilcher Park Horse Trail near Route 6 and Farrell Road on the town's east side and declared dead about 12:55 p.m., authorities said.

The death is being investigated as a homicide, and an autopsy will be conducted Tuesday, the Will County Coroner's Office said. The female's identity was being held pending notification of next of kin, the coroner's office said.

May 28, 2007
By CHRISTINA CHAPMAN Staff Writer
JOLIET TOWNSHIP — The body of an unidentified female was found Monday on the Pilcher Park horse trail, but it is not missing Plainfield mother, Lisa Stebic.
Joliet police are investigating the death as a homicide, according to the county coroner’s office, but little information has been released.
Police responded to a 911 call at the trail off of U.S. 6 and Farrell Road. Two horseback riders came across the body on the ground just before 9 a.m.
Police Chief Fred Hayes said The body of a black girl, believed to be in her early teens, was found at the entrance to the horse trail on U.S. 6 and Farrell, next to Pine Ridge Apartments on Parkwood Drive.
The victim had a plastic bag over her head and upper torso and had been set on fire, Hayes said.
“The victim has yet to be identified,” Hayes said. She was wearing a brown button-down shirt with a red tank top.
The victim was pronounced dead at 12:55 p.m. by the coroner. An autopsy is planned for 1 p.m. today.
Keith Silzer, who lives two houses from the trail entrance, said police questioned him Monday morning.
“There was about 15 squads and 10 unmarked (cars) and they knocked on my door at about 9:15 a.m.,” Silzer said.
Silzer said his girlfriend heard a noise similar to a gunshot between 12:30 and 1 a.m., but the couple wrote it off as fireworks, he said.
“We didn’t think anything of it since it is so close to the Fourth (of July); they light them almost every night anyway,” Silzer said.
Silzer said the police left the area a little after 3 p.m. Police dogs were out sniffing the neighborhood and the trail.
“Detectives have done an extensive search of the wooded area and canvassed the apartments and houses on Parkwood,” Hayes said. “We have no reports of anyone missing.”

Bill Ward has worked on more than 700 police investigations across the country, everything from missing persons to homicides to bank robberies.
Most of the time he doesn't leave his house to work. He says he just sees what happened.

Ward, of Lockport, says he is a psychic, an ability he thinks developed after working as a medic during the Vietnam War.

He doesn't seek recognition or payment for his services, and he doesn't contact police. They call him, he said.

"Why should police believe me? They don't have to. I just tell them what I see," he said. "Pictures just start coming in, just like I'm watching TV. It was scary at first, but you get kind of used to it."

Last edited by chicoliving; 07-05-2007 at 04:10 PM.
Reason: copyright; post a paragraph or two only

Lisa Stebic, Plainfield mother of two, vanishes, and within weeks her husband complains the police are squeezing him for a confession.

If anybody can empathize with the husband of Lisa Stebic, it is the husband of Inge Strama, Plainfield mother of two.

Inge Strama disappeared in July 1993. While the police never came out and named her husband, Frank Strama, as a suspect in the case, he believed he was the focus of their scrutiny.

"Statistically, it is the husband that's involved a lot of the time," he said a year after his wife vanished. "I was a suspect, and I was interrogated several times."

Maybe he was interrogated, and maybe he was the target of the police investigation. But that's where it ended. Fourteen years later, Frank Strama is still a free man. He lives in the same Indian Boundary Road home as when his wife went missing, although he is alone now.

His two sons moved out, and his wife never came back; they found her decomposed remains in an overgrown, empty lot in southwest suburban Worth in August 1997.

Last edited by chicoliving; 07-05-2007 at 04:09 PM.
Reason: copyright; post a paragraph or two only

Article contains erroneous info, in that Lisa has been missing over a month (four weeks this past Monday).

The search for Lisa Stebic continues
May 31, 2007

LIBERTYVILLE -- It has been three weeks since Lisa Stebic disappeared. No new information as to the whereabouts of the Plainfield woman has been uncovered, leaving her family and friends distraught with uncertainty.

"My wife and I are in total anguish and sorrow," said Milton Ruttenberg of Wheeling, her grandfather. "All I hope is that this comes to some sort of a conclusion and this whole thing can be over with."